


Flu-Induced

by lifespossible



Series: Sherlock Sleeps (One Way or Another) [2]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Sickfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-21
Updated: 2013-07-21
Packaged: 2017-12-20 20:53:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,060
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/891737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lifespossible/pseuds/lifespossible
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock contracts the flu, leaving poor John to take care of him.</p>
<p>Established Johnlock, fluff</p>
            </blockquote>





	Flu-Induced

John Watson was a doctor. An army doctor, if you wanted to be specific, but the title 'doctor' was plenty enough, thank you.

Just because he was a doctor, however, did not mean he had anymore leverage over a Mister Sherlock Holmes's health than anyone else.

"I think it's the flu, Sherlock."

"Don't be obvious, John, of course it's the flu. The aches, the nausea, not to mention the forced exposure to the virus."

John rolled his eyes. "If I remember correctly, I did not force you to come to the clinic. You did that completely on your own accord."

Sherlock scoffed. The consulting detective was lying on the couch, from where he had been complaining the entire morning. "If you had chosen to tak the day off as I had asked, I would not have had to come rescue you from that virus-infested place so that you could spend your lunch with me." At this, John snorted. Sherlock continued as if he hadn't. "Therefore, it is your fault even more so, because you are the one who complains when I do not eat. If you had stayed home, you would have ensured my intake of food without exposing me to any heinous viruses."

John sighed, kneeling on the floor next to the couch and placing his medical kit on the coffee table. "You ask me to stay home every morning," he said, brushing Sherlock's curls back to place a hand on his forehead.

"And yet you fail to comply," Sherlock said. His voice held its usual loftiness, but the detective's appearance screamed contradictions to the sound. He was curled up on the couch, clad in pyjama pants and a ratty t-shirt underneath one of his many dressing gowns, and his skin was paler than average- though John couldn't fathom how that was possible.

John sighed again, moving his palm from Sherlock's slightly-too-warm forehead to cup the detective's cheek, and despite his annoyed tone, Sherlock leaned into John's hand.

"Well, I'm taking the day now," John said, removing his hand and standing up.

Sherlock frowned at the loss of contact, then crossed his arms over his chest. "Because I'm ill, though. I want you to take a day when we're both perfectly healthy and can spend it however we want, preferably not moving from the bedroom."

"Then maybe you should get vaccines when I tell you to," John said smoothly, leaning over and rummaging in his kit.

"Boring," Sherlock managed to mutter before a thermometer was shoved into his mouth.

"Leave that there," John said, turning and walking towards the kitchen. "I'm going to make some tea."

"If you put melatonin in it again, I swear that no-one will find your body!" Sherlock's voice called, voice slightly awkward as he spoke around the thermometer.

John snorted. He knew he'd only be able to do that once. The doctor moved around the kitchen, flipping on the kettle and taking out teabags. After a moment of debate, he also threw a couple pieces of bread into the toaster. Though Sherlock had been complaining about nausea, he'd yet to throw up anything. Perhaps he'd feel better if the man had something in his stomach.

The kettle started whistling, and John pulled down two mugs. Perhaps if he ate more often, Sherlock wouldn't be sick in the first place. John smiled at the thought as he poured boiling water into the mugs and placed the teabags in them to steep. A high-pitched beep came from the living room. "Tell me what it says," John called as the toast popped up.

"Thirty-eight point four," came Sherlock's reply. John could practically hear the pout in his voice, mad at the world for making him ill.

John nodded, though Sherlock couldn't see him. He took the toast out, cutting each piece into two triangles. Two plain pieces for Sherlock, two with butter and jam for him. He placed them on a plate, then put the plate on a tray. He threw the teabags in the bin, then moved the mugs to the tray as well. John picked up the tray and carried it into the living room, hoping he could manage to deal with an ill consulting detective all day.

* * *

Sherlock was miserable. And for once, it was not because he was bored.

Sherlock hated the flu, with a passion. As a child, he'd been almost as bad about eating as he was as an adult- then, though, he had Mummy to make sure he was getting his meals. And if not Mummy, then a nanny or a housekeeper. He'd also been adamant about not getting vaccines- being a child, however, he usually ended up with them anyway. Despite this, though, he'd chronically had the flu or a cold, and spent most of the winter months tucked away inside.

He had hated it.

And now, he was ill again. He'd been hoping that all the illness as a child had built up a little bit of an immunity- and up until today, he thought it had. He was never ill, which was why, when his throat had gotten a little sore and his nose a little runny a few days ago, he'd brushed it off. Now though, it was apparent that he shouldn't have done that.

Sherlock moaned, rolling over and clutching his stomach. The toast John had brought him earlier that morning had already come back up, along with the tea. A bin was sitting next to the couch, ready if he needed it.

He really, really hated having the flu.

Perhaps the one and only upside to this was that he had John's complete and total attention. Yes, Sherlock could get it other ways, but this was different. He was not only under John's eye as a partner, but also as a patient. And it was...nice. Yes, it was nice, Sherlock decided. Because John had dragged his chair over from the fireplace and set up next to the couch, where he could run his hand through Sherlock's hair and monitor Sherlock's every move.

Nice, indeed.

"You okay? Gonna be sick again?"

Sherlock shook his head, then immediately regretted it as a wave of pain rolled through his head. He was unable to stop the low moan that came out of his mouth.

John made a clucking noise, his cool palm coming down onto Sherlock's warm forehead- it was the only part of his body that was warm, he was cold everywhere else. "It's alright, love," John was muttering. Sherlock wasn't really paying attention- all of his attention was focused on the feel of John's hand on his forehead, memorizing every detail of it. He made a whimpering noise that, on any other day, he would have been horrified had even come close to coming out of his mouth. Thankfully, John, wonderful John, understood and stood up from his chair, walking across the room and returning a moment later with a blanket that he carefully tucked around the detective, mindful that Sherlock's body was aching and making sure his feet where captured under the blanket as well. It helped a little bit, but not near as much as the kiss that was pressed onto Sherlock's forehead as John walked to the kitchen.

"You should drink something. Water, tea, apple juice. Any of the above. I can run down to Tesco if you want a Powerade or something. Electrolytes would be good for you."

"Water. Socks," Sherlock mumbled, curling up tighter in an attempt to fight his chills. "Tylenol," he added as the many aches in his body reminded him of their presence. He heard John moving around the kitchen. The clink of a glass, the water running, a couple of quiet thuds as John rummaged around for the medicine. Then there were footsteps, and John was standing in front of him again, gently nudging his leg with his knee.

"Come on. Sit up. Can't drink lying down like that."

Sherlock didn't move. "Straw."

Even with his eyes closed (he didn't remember closing them), Sherlock could see the annoyed expression that crossed John's face, followed by a heavy exhale through the nose as John reminded himself that Sherlock was ill, and therefore, to be put up with a bit more than usual. Then he heard the glass being put on the coffee table, along with two pills being dropped next to it before John walked into the kitchen again to dig through the drawers in hope of finding a straw. There was much rummaging, the clinking of utensils, a muttered curse- he must have found the mustard-mold experiment, then- and then the bumps and thuds of drawers and cabinets being closed. Footsteps.

"Open your eyes, at least, then. I don't want you stabbing yourself in the face because you can't see where the straw is."

Rather begrudgingly, Sherlock opened his eyes. John was standing in front of him, pills fisted in one hand and the glass in the other. Sure enough, the doctor had managed to find a straw- lime green and plastic that curved all around. Where they had even gotten it, Sherlock didn't know. Sherlock held a hand out flat, popped the pills that were placed there into his mouth, then accepted the water to wash them down without sitting up. John didn't say anything, simply took the glass when Sherlock was finished and placed it on the coffee table again. Then he was walking away again, presumably to get the socks Sherlock had asked for.

Sherlock sighed, pulling the blanket up under his chin as the water he had just ingested sloshed around in his stomach. He knew it would be at least fifteen minutes for the medicine to start working, but that didn't make it much easier to deal with the pain that was running amuck in his body, from his stomach to his head to his calves.

All of the sudden it was too much, the blanket and the sloshing in his stomach and the fatigue and the downright miserableness. They were all too much, and before Sherlock knew what was happening he was sitting up straight and vomiting violently into the bin, emptying his stomach of what little was there. He didn't hear John run out of his bedroom, or even feel the sofa shift as the doctor sat down. All he was aware of was John's arms wrapping around him, John's gentle voice muttering in his ear as he ran a hand up and down Sherlock's back. Then John was prying the bin out of his hands, unfazed by the contents or the smell, taking it into the kitchen. Then he was back, a cool, damp cloth wiping his mouth and forehead, then being pressed onto the back of his neck against the sweat-dampened curls there, and it felt so,  _so_  good.

Suddenly, a glass was pressed into his hands once more. "Sip. Then spit," John said, placing a clean bin in between Sherlock's feet. Sherlock took the advice, immediately becoming away of the disgusting aftertaste that was left in his mouth. He took a drink, swished it around, then spat into the bin. He'd have to brush his teeth at some point, but at the moment he wasn't sure he could handle the taste of toothpaste. Then he was taking careful, tiny sips, trying to avoid the sloshy feeling in his stomach again. "There you go," John was saying, sitting down and beginning to rub his back again. "It's alright."

On any other day, Sherlock would have brushed those phrases off. Today, however, he was too ill and miserable to do anything other than sag onto John's shoulder, pressing his nose into the well-worn jumper and breathing in John's scent. John continued rubbing Sherlock's back, slowly working out the knots that had formed over the day, and making the other aches that the flu brought slowly fade away.

Sherlock sighed into John's shoulder, not really feeling better, but a little more stable than he had been half an hour before. "I love you," he mumbled into John's shoulder.

He couldn't see John's face, but he knew that John was smiling. "I love you too," the doctor said, pressing a kiss on top of Sherlock's head as the detective drifted to sleep, still sitting up, still leaning into John, but feeling more relaxed than he had the whole day.


End file.
